


Temple Coffee

by not_my_century



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe- No Supernatural, F/F, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-26
Updated: 2015-08-26
Packaged: 2018-04-17 09:47:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4662087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/not_my_century/pseuds/not_my_century
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When one of the baristas calls in sick, maintenance worker Pearl very, very reluctantly fills in for her. Customer service jobs are Pearl's worst nightmare, but there is one perk: an incredibly gorgeous customer who might actually be interested in her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Temple Coffee

**Author's Note:**

> This comes out of yet another attempt to do a modified version of the 30 Day Cliche AU Challenge, which at this point I have no idea where I found. I may or may not actually complete the challenge. It'll probably be more of a 30 YEAR challenge, the way I tend to work. Anyway, the world needs more cute fluffy Pearlrose.
> 
> Beta'd by tumblr user [amettrine](http://amettrine.tumblr.com)! <3
> 
> Also posted [here](http://aroacenoahczerny.tumblr.com/post/127655526435/fic-temple-coffee) on Tumblr for Pearlrose Bomb. I'm on Tumblr at [aroacenoahczerny](http://aroacenoahczerny.tumblr.com)!
> 
> Warning for a couple of mild ableist slurs (Pearl yells at herself a lot) and very mild swearing (Amethyst). Other than that, it's pretty much fluff all the way.

“Hey Pearl, that girl you have a giant crush on is here,” Amethyst yells from the stockroom, punctuated by a crash as the pile of boxes she’s using to reach the tiny window above the parking lot finally decides to give in.

 

“ _Amethyst!_ I do _not_ —wait, where? I mean, oh…. uh…” Pearl tries to control her blush and fails, as usual. According to Amethyst, the most irritating of her coworkers, “it’s like, _so_ obvious when you like someone, ‘cause your face gets all red and you get this dopey look in your eyes and you’re soooo flustered. It’s _hilarious._ ” (She usually takes this moment to remind Pearl of her brief “lame nerd crush” on Garnet when she started working at Temple Coffee a year ago, usually in front of Garnet, as if the incredible amounts of teasing every time Pearl so much as reacts to a cute girl weren’t enough.)

 

“Oh, I see her outside,” Garnet says, and Pearl jumps and feels her face getting even warmer. It’s all she can do not to run and hide behind the espresso machine. Or possibly Garnet. Garnet _and_ the espresso machine?

 

“Oh my god, P, you look like you’re gonna _explode_ ,” Amethyst says, snickering, and Pearl briefly considers throwing her out the window of Garnet’s parents’ apartment upstairs. Then she thinks she’d probably be better served by throwing _herself_ out the window, because the door is making its usual tinny electronic chime and sure enough, in walks what is probably the most beautiful girl in the world in a flurry of pink curls and swirling skirts.

 

“Make a move, dumbass,” Amethyst says through her teeth, nudging the much taller Pearl in the hip with her elbow. Before Pearl can berate her for this, she’s disappeared back into the stockroom again, still snickering. There’s even a smirk on the usually-stoic Garnet’s face. Pearl decides that she hates everyone in the entire world and also disappearing would be great right about now.

 

“Hi, Pearl!”

 

Pearl’s brain short-circuits because this is not supposed to happen. Not even regulars actually bother to read anyone’s nametag, and this girl—Rose, her cup had said yesterday—has only seen her once. Pearl remembers their brief encounter yesterday afternoon with perfect clarity and has replayed it over and over in her head, which is, as Amethyst loves to remind her, pretty pathetic.

 

Yesterday had otherwise been pretty terrible. Pearl is not at all cut out for customer service—social anxiety, a lot of trouble reading people and a tendency to be blunt, among many, many other things, mean that even being in the coffee shop with the potential to talk to another human is the highest form of torture for her. Her job is maintenance, mostly—making sure the ancient espresso machine makes it through the day, that the equally temperamental heating system doesn’t get stuck on high, and generally keeping the equipment from exploding. The building is kind of on its last legs, but she finds a way to keep it running on a very low budget, and, occasionally, fills in for one of the few baristas in an emergency. She prefers her other job teaching fencing at the gym down the street, but neither one pays very well and finishing her Ph.D. in electrical engineering isn’t exactly cheap. Sapphire and Ruby, Garnet’s parents and the shop’s owners, are very considerate and don’t usually ask her to step out of her comfort zone, but yesterday they’d been desperate. Lapis Lazuli, one of the baristas, had been “unexpectedly called away” (whatever that meant) for a few days and there was no one to fill in for her. No one, that is, besides Pearl. Unfortunately.

 

Luckily, Garnet had been taking the orders, and Pearl was pretty good at mixing drinks, but even just calling out people’s names stressed her out. Every time, she mentally kicked herself— _read that wrong, that sounded so stupid, what are you, a robot? Get it together, Pearl_ —and every time someone came to pick up a drink she wanted to run and hide. (She will admit that she actually did do that a couple of times. Garnet was very obliging. The espresso machine not so much.)

 

She had given up and was just looking at the floor by three, waiting for the last half hour of her—well, Lapis’s—shift to be over. “Rose,” she’d half-mumbled, giving the cinnamon dolce latte’s cup another cursory glance, and steeled herself for yet another unnecessary physical contact with yet another stranger with who knew what germs all over their hands.

 

“Oh, that’s me!” someone had said, and the voice sounded so sweet that Pearl had to look up. “Rose” was gorgeous. Big eyes, candy-pink lip gloss that looked like it would probably taste good, _so much hair_ in an equally sweet shade of pink that looked like it would have taken buckets of dye. Pearl’s brain had started trying to calculate just how much dye she’d used, and also if the curls were natural or not, and then she noticed that the girl had a small nose stud and some kind of pink gem as a bellybutton piercing, and _then_ she started thinking about how the cut-up band t-shirt and jean shorts emphasized the girl’s amazing curves, aaaaand she had just been staring. Probably for a really long time. The drink was still in her hands.

 

Pearl couldn’t make words happen, which was not an incredibly common occurrence but tended to happen in the face of cute girls, so she just shoved the drink at the image of pure perfection in front of her and tried to remember how to breathe. Rose had said thank you, and beamed at her, and Pearl was pretty sure that if she’d proposed right then she would have said yes. That is, if her voice ever started working.

 

This morning, Garnet had told her that Rose had paid for the person behind her in line, because of course she had, and also that she sometimes comes in and gets drinks for the guys working on the new building across the street and the panhandlers down the block. So basically, Rose is a literal actual goddess and Pearl isn’t even worthy to be in her presence.

 

And Rose actually knows her name.

 

Pearl realizes that she’s probably been gaping _forever_ instead of responding. Great. Screwing things up already. Classic Pearl. (This last part echoes in her head in a voice that sounds suspiciously like Amethyst’s.)

 

“Um, hi, Rose!” _Is that really the best you can do? That was so lame! You shouldn’t even be allowed to talk!_ she berates herself. _Wait, crap, it’s weird that I know her name. It’s weird, right?_ “It, uh, it is Rose, right?” _Is that better? No, that’s worse, now she thinks I hate her oh my god I screwed everything up—_

“Yeah! I’m so glad you remembered!” Rose is beaming at her. She looks even more gorgeous today, if that’s even possible, in a white tiered maxi dress and a big straw sunhat. Pearl _knows_ she’s blushing, _oh god she must know, why am I just_ standing _here_ say _something Pearl—_

“I can take your order over here,” Garnet interrupts, giving Pearl a pointed look that’s not exactly subtle. Pearl hates her, she really does. So much.

 

Rose orders a chai latte and Pearl tries not to stare but fails miserably. She nearly falls over when Rose turns back to her and asks “So, how long have you been working here? I haven’t seen you before!”

 

“Uhh, I usually do maintenance type stuff, I’m just filling in for someone this week,” she says, managing to keep most of the shaking out of her voice.

 

“Oh! Well, you’re a wonderful barista, my latte yesterday was the best I’ve ever had,” Rose says, smiling again, and Pearl thinks she might actually mean it. She has to hold onto the edge of the counter for a minute, and she can see her knuckles turning white. Who _says_ stuff like that?

 

“Uh, thank you?” It comes out as a question, and Pearl grips the counter harder, knowing how weird it sounds.

 

Garnet hands her the cup with a well-placed eyebrow raise, and Pearl tries to glare at her surreptitiously.

 

“I, uh, I’m not exactly good at customer service,” Pearl blurts out, and immediately wants to take it back. She tries to backtrack. “I’m, I’m not so…. used to it, so I—um—”

 

“Oh, I understand! You probably feel like everyone’s staring at you and judging you all the time, right? It must be hard,” Rose says, and she really does understand, which is a little staggering.

 

“I kind of keep waiting for someone to yell at me,” Pearl admits. “Some people treat anyone behind a counter as some kind of robot that can get your order exactly perfect even when it’s impossible. And I _build_ robots, so I can tell you that even they aren’t always perfect.” She probably shouldn’t be saying this to a customer, and she feels like she’s doing yet another thing wrong, and she just wants to crawl into the corner and sit there until her shift is over and not talk to anyone ever again.

 

“Damn right,” Amethyst chimes in from behind her.

 

“Amethyst! Language!” Pearl yells automatically. “I’m sorry about her,” she tells Rose. “She likes to _eavesdrop on conversations that don’t include her_.” The last part is said pointedly over her shoulder.

 

“Okay! Sorry dude! Geez, Pearl, do you have to be so…” Whatever else she says is lost to the noise of the blender as Garnet makes someone else a smoothie. It’s probably a good thing.

 

Rose is holding back a giggle, and Pearl thinks she must look ridiculous. Any chance she might have had has now completely evaporated. Great.

 

“So are you an engineer? That’s amazing,” Rose says, seemingly ignoring the whole mini-drama that’s just happened.

 

“What? Oh. Um, yeah, I’m working on my Ph.D.,” Pearl says, staring resolutely at an old coffee stain on the counter, and only just remembers that the drink is ready and the next thing she should do is hand it over.

 

“Wow! Would you show me some of the things you’ve designed sometime? I’d love to see them.”

 

“You—what?” Is this actually happening? This is actually happening, right? “I mean, they’re just small things, nothing special really—”

 

“I’m sure anything you make is just as wonderful as my latte yesterday,” Rose says, still smiling, and Pearl starts to reconsider her chances. Is this… flirting?

 

Amethyst elbows her for probably the fifth time today and stage-whispers “Give her your number, dumbass!” Much as she’d love to yell at Amethyst again, she’s probably right. At least, Pearl really hopes she’s right.

 

“Er, if you want, I could give you my number…?” Pearl says, probably sounding way too hopeful. She sees Amethyst high-fiving Garnet out of the corner of her eye and winces.

 

Much to her surprise, Rose immediately says “I’d love that!” She seems not to have noticed Amethyst and Garnet’s blatant matchmaking, or if she has, she’s being very polite about it. “Here, why don’t you just write it on the cup?”

 

Garnet hands her a Sharpie with what seems to be a wink, and Pearl tries to keep her hands from shaking as she carefully writes down her number.

 

“I’ll give you a call soon,” Rose says, with something that sounds like perfect sincerity. It can’t really be this simple, can it? “Oh, are you free this weekend? There’s this gallery opening I’m going to, but I have an extra ticket and no plus one yet.”

 

That sounds a lot like a date. It’s a date, right? Please let it be a date. “You mean like a date?” Pearl’s mouth says while her brain yellsWHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT YOU IDIOT at her.

 

“Well, yes! Sorry, I guess I wasn’t that clear. I thought you were really cute when I came here yesterday and I almost wanted to ask you out then, but I wasn’t sure if you liked girls. It’s always kind of hard to tell when girls are asking you out, though, huh? Gotta love heteronormativity.”

 

Part of Pearl’s brain is remembering all the times in middle school and high school when people asked her out as a joke and wondering when the punchline is going to hit, but another, very large part of it is screaming incoherently because the most amazing beautiful girl in the world thinks that _Pearl_ is _cute_.

 

“Oh, she definitely likes girls,” Amethyst chimes in with a smirk, taking advantage of the fact that words momentarily aren’t working for Pearl again.

 

“ _Amethyst!_ ” Pearl’s face is probably on fire from the way it feels right now. “That’s—that’s not—I mean, yes! Yes, a date would be—ama—great, cool, really cool. Um.” It’s all she can do to keep herself from proposing right then and there.

 

Rose laughs, which is the most beautiful sound in the world, probably, and then glances regretfully at her watch and says she has to go but she’ll call soon. Pearl just nods, still stunned, and stares dreamily at the spot where she used to be long after she’s left.

 

“Dude, Pearl, congrats! You got yourself a hot date,” Amethyst says, sounding actually impressed for once, and even Garnet says “Good job,” which from her is high praise.

 

“A date,” Pearl repeats, still processing, and then says “Oh my god, she asked me out! _Oh my god_ ” and collapses to the floor behind the counter.

 

(She may or may not twirl around her apartment a few times when she gets home. She definitely does not scream and nearly drop her phone when she gets a text from an unknown number that says “Hey cutie! It’s Rose!” and she absolutely denies ever having put several hearts next to Rose’s contact name and promptly deleting them.) 


End file.
